Have you got any delicious-looking books on your shelves which you know you will read at some point, but in the meantime you just love seeing them there? (As the time just keeps passing on....)

A few of mine are:

Angela Carter and the Fairy Tale --doesn't this sound wonderful? And so is the table of contents.....

The Antiheroine's Voice: Narrative Discourse and Transaformation in the Picaresque -- I love antiheroines and I love the form of the picaresque.

No Man's Land: The Place of the Woman Writers in the Twentieth Century, V. 1: The War of the Words and V. 2: Sexchanges (haven't got volume 3 yet, maybe that's what I'm waiting for? ;-)

Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth and Art - yummy! By Lewis Hyde, and he's got another title I want to set next to this.


What are yours? Please tell, so I can order them from Amazon and stare at them on my bookshelves....

Ani

Orientalism by Edward Said, I'm ashamed to say that I have made it past the intro yet - but I will! The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiesen, bought to read in Tibet in August 2003, but there was too much to see there to spend time reading. And When we were Orphans by Kazuo Ishiguru - the Shanghai setting appealed.

Adele.

<Added>

have = haven't in line 1, but it seems you understood anyway!

Aha! I've had Orientalism on my wish list for some time. (My Amazon wish list is one of the stages of this admiration game!) I suspect that I would admire it on my shelf for some time, too.... (But Adele, I do believe that you will read it through to the end when the right moment comes!)

Ani have you read Edward Said's memoir Out of Place? I loved that, although a Jewish told me later that most of it's made up. Who can ever know the truth of another person's life?

Adele.

<Added>

Jewish = Jewish friend - I still haven't woken up. Obviously a sign the lie down for a while, in front of the tennis :)

lol -- No, I haven't. I only read an excerpt from Orientalism when I was doing my master's, and after, when I married someone from Syria, my interest perked. But, as you see, sometimes it can take me a while to get around to doing things.... ;-)

Should I add it to my wish list?

Ani

Fact or fiction, I'd recommend it. Btw, are you really that Emma woman who married President Assad?
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/worldview/story/0,11581,860417,00.html

Adele.

Porn Star by Ian Gittler.

Oh I can't fool you, I read that one. But it's got such a great photo of Savannah on the cover, and not the I'm talking about the city in Georgia.

<Added>

aye, my grammatics got a bit muffled there, I'l let you use your imagination to try and decipher what I was "trying" to say.

Adam,

I did understand what you wrote and didn't even think about the typos until I read your edit! haha

Adele,

Interesting article, that, although it's not me, I am afraid! She sounds like an interesting one, with an interesting life ahead of her. My ex-husband's mother's name was Asma, but that's as close as I get.... I have a lovely customs story from Damascus: when I was leaving there after having met my new husband's family (how we got married is another story - have to write it out, I think), they sent me with so many gifts that it took both of us sitting on my suitcase to get it closed. Naturally, the customs official took a look at that suitcase and dedcided I should open it for inspection. The problem was I couldn't open it. After several minutes struggling with the latches, I started crying - it's NOT a manipulative tactic, it's a sign of frustration, guys don't seem to understand this - but at the sight of tears I was brushed on through. Thank gog - I don't know how I would have ever closed it again because I was alone by that time.

Oh, anecdotes. Love 'em.

Ani

Ani, you must have some fascinating tales to tell. Get writing that memoir!

Adam, on Georgia, have you read Tom Wolfe's A Man in Full? He has a character called Charlie Croker, a CEO who runs six miles every day before breakfast so that he will live for ever - I love that line!


Adele.

I recently bought the complete Chronicals of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson.

I've read them before, and am just cutting into Lord Foul's Bane. It's as enjoyable as I remember, and I love dthe covers as a kid. It wa sthe covers that first attracted me to the story, even though I was only ten. I distinctly remember sitting on a massive bookshelf in boarding school and finding a battered copy of The One Tree.

I tracked down the first book and read all six between the ages of ten and twelve. Re-reading them is like revisiting childhood, and the story is that much different through adult eyes.

I still love all those fantasy covers though, and can't wait to read the new one Runes of the Earth

JB

JB, I bought the first volume Of TCC in the seventies because I loved the cover, and I was hooked from page one. I bought all six volumes, and still have them. They’re very battered because my partner and I have read them so many times.

The Runes Of The Earth is the most sumptuous book to look at. It’s big, fat, solidly hardback. The cover is black and gold and silver. The pages are thick and white. It’s a damned good story too…

Dee

I really can't wait, bur because I read the originals so long ago, I thought I'd better catch up!

JB

'Delicious-looking' is definitely "The French Kitchen" - Joanne Harris. Sorry if this is supposed to be very literary! I haven't actually cooked anything from it yet but the photographs are just wonderful. France - Mmmm.

joanie